Out of Reach
by Fleur the First
Summary: Aunt Petunia receives a bottle of perfume and sets Harry's thoughts down a trail that leads to some interesting discoveries. Ron couldn't fancy Hermione, could he? Read as feelings are danced around with extreme ease.


Out of Reach

Author's Note: 

Warning, this author's note contains spoilers for those who have not completed book five. Why you may be reading fanfiction when there's actual book to be read is another issue all together.

This story has been written because OotP is the best book in the world, and I love it dearly. However, it's dedicated to Sirius. He will always live on in my heart. Oh, and the air-conditioning window-unit I installed last night, I named it the Sirius Black Air Memorial. SBAM for short.

Disclaimer: I don't own HP, and I certainly don't own Elizabeth Barrett Browning or her poetry. 

***

"Oh, Vernon, it's lovely!" Harry stifled a snort as his aunt threw her arms around her large husband and barely managed to get hold of the front of him.

Uncle Vernon had just secured a new client, a very wealthy new client. To celebrate Vernon had taken both Dudley and Petunia out for dinner, then came home and gave them each a gift. Dudley had gotten a new pair of boxing gloves ("Best on the market!" Vernon had commented proudly.) Aunt Petunia had received a large bottle of perfume that had been imported from Paris.

Immediately after receiving the present Aunt Petunia began to spray it wildly on her neck and wrists. Harry barely stifled a cough as the scent wafted towards him on the other side of the room. Before he could do so, and therefore alert his "family" to his presence, Harry dodged up the stairs and into his small room. 

Sighing, Harry sunk onto his bed. It was only the beginning of the summer and Harry already felt misery at his situation. It wasn't that the Dursleys were being horrible. Indeed, they were being positively _kind_. Just the other morning Harry had taken a second piece of toast at the breakfast table and nobody had done anything to stop him.

Apparently Moody's eye had made an impression.

Guilt and sadness threatened to invade him as Harry looked over at his Firebolt, which was resting against the wall. It still gleamed as if it had never been used, as if Sirius had just given it to him. Tears welled up in his green eyes, but Harry stubbornly swept them away. The time for tears was gone.

Purposely trying to think of something else, Harry directed his thoughts once again to the smell of his aunt's perfume, which had since traveled up the stairs and into his room. It wasn't exactly a pleasant smell, Harry reflected, it was a bit to heavy for his liking. But then, Harry wasn't exactly an expert on perfume. He knew he wouldn't even attempt to buy it for a girl until he was sure he was madly in love with them.

Harry froze.

Something about his last thought hit him hard, for it seemed as if it pertained to him somehow.

Was he madly in love with a girl? Harry shook his head, he would remember that.

Slowly, a memory started to drift back to him, one that had nothing to do with Dark Lords, evil teachers, or lost loved ones.

Ron had given Hermione perfume for Christmas!

          "No," Harry said aloud, causing Hedwig to hoot cheerfully. Harry turned to her and raised an eyebrow. "You don't think Ron fancies Hermione, do you?"

Hedwig hooted again, causing Harry to gape. "He does, doesn't he?"

It occurred to Harry that he was talking to an owl, or rather he was talking and the owl was hooting. 

Harry walked over to his desk and grabbed a piece of parchment from the drawer. He then got out his quill and wrote a short message:

          _Ron,_

_          You don't fancy Hermione, do you?_

_          Harry_

Within minutes the letter was on its way, and Harry was staring out into the sky, wondering if he had done the right thing in confronting Ron with such a subject. What if he was wrong? Would Ron be upset, hurt, under the impression Harry was mad?

Still feeling uneasy, Harry turned in for the night, terrified at whatever answer Ron sent back to him.

***

Three days later Harry was sitting at his desk, writing an essay on the importance of Garblegack Gimlen, a goblin who had stopped the practice of torching prisoners feet when they were captured and awaiting a trial.

Needless to say, he wasn't that upset when he was interrupted by a familiar hoot. Harry handed his owl a treat, untied the parchment she had strapped to her leg, and began to read.

          _Harry,_

_Don't know where you come up with this stuff, mate. Course I don't fancy Hermione. I mean, it's not like I'm Viktor Krum or anything, right? She hasn't mentioned old Vicky lately, what do you reckon of that?_  _She won't tell me anything about the bloke, but perhaps she's told you. _

_Ron_

Harry found only more confusion in Ron's letter. He had expected Ron to be a bit angrier with him for asking something so silly, but instead Ron was completely dismissive, as if he didn't want the subject brought up. 

And then there were all the references to Krum, a person Ron seemed to despise for no apparent reason other than the fact that he had taken Hermione to the Yule Ball. Harry hadn't let himself dwell on his best friend's jealously long after the ball, but now the signs seemed to be pointing to the idea that Ron felt more than friendship towards Hermione.

Now that he thought about it, Harry distinctly remembered telling Ron a book that Hermione wanted, but Ron had disregarded the advice and gotten her some _eau de toilette_ instead. 

Interesting, Harry mused as he continued on with his essay, very interesting indeed.

***

Back at the Burrow, Ronald Weasley was in a panic. How had Harry _known?_ Perhaps his prophetic dreams had shifted focus and were now showing him images of Ron and Hermione as a couple?

But then again, probably not.

Ron fretted about Harry's note for days, reliving his entire fifth year repeatedly for any signs of outward displays of affection-like feelings towards Hermione. The list he compiled was sort of depressing.

1. Complimented her more on how smart she was. Not my fault though, since she's so amazing.

2. Perhaps stood still a bit too long after she kissed my cheek. But then, what was I supposed to do, she kissed me…

3. Got called many nasty names by her that she would never call anybody else. She only cares about _me_ enough to think up such great insults. So take THAT, Krum. 

4. Bought her perfume for Christmas after spending all of a Hogsmeade trip searching for the one perfect gift.

It had to be the perfume, Ron reflected, after all, it was the only time he had visibly shown his affection-like feelings for Hermione. She'd kissed him, yes, but she'd done the same to Harry. Actually, she'd kissed him twice if you counted the time at the train station in their fourth year.

But since Ron wasn't counting it, she'd kissed them both once.

But she had to have meant it more with Ron, because she'd told him once that Harry was like her brother when the aforementioned brother-like person was in detention.

But did that also mean that she thought of Ron as a brother, and he had missed the inference that she felt that way about _both_ of them?

But perhaps she was inferring that it was okay for him to like her since there was no way she and Harry would ever, in a million, trillion, gazillion years, ever even remotely like each other _that way_.

Or something along those lines. 

Inference, Ron thought despairingly, if anything in the world was harder to analyze, he'd never heard of it. After a second bit of consideration Ron scratched that thought and revised it. Inference was the hardest thing to analyze right after the female psyche. 

Which, really, is quite amazing, because not many people know that Ron knows the term psyche. He does, though, because Hermione had gone on about it once for a good forty-five minutes and he had listened enough of those minutes to get a vague idea of the whole concept.

Right then.

***

Blissfully unaware of any of the turmoil that was going on in the lives of either of her best friends, Hermione Granger was thoroughly enjoying her summer. She'd spent almost every day at the local library, reveling in her opportunity to catch up on Muggle works. Hogwarts didn't keep much around, only a few volumes of Plato and Aristotle. 

The poetry was her favorite, though, especially the poetess Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Hermione had spent hours pouring over her works, displaying the romantic that few knew lurked inside of her. Sometimes she would even read them aloud and sigh contentedly, creating a very un-Hermione like picture. 

This was the first summer, however, when the sighs and the readings actually had acquired a meaning. For now, instead of looking towards the future, and thinking that someday she would find a person that made her feel the way the poems did, she thought that someday the person that made her feel the way the poems did would feel the same way about her.

And though these feelings might have seemed confusing to anybody who was not Hermione, they made perfect sense to her. 

Hermione would often think such things as she read Browning's sonnets, all the while stealing glances at her dresser, which held atop it a bottle of cheap perfume that had the most unusual scent she'd ever come across in her life. It smelled like cinnamon at Christmas time, warm and inviting, nothing like the cool flowery types her mother had always worn. But Hermione liked it all the same, because it made her forget about the darkness that was approaching, but instead about her favorite Weasley, who had always been the warmest and most inviting person she knew.

And she wasn't thinking about Molly. 

Hermione would laugh at such musings, telling herself that there was not enough time in her life for romance. Especially romance with Ron, which would probably be just as exhausting as the real Ron was.

But someday, Hermione would think, someday…she would very much like to be exhausted by him. 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnet XIII

And wilt thou have me fashion into speech

The love I bear thee, finding words enough,

And hold the torch out, while the winds are rough,

Between our faces, to cast light on each?--

I drop at thy feet. I cannot teach

My hand to hold my spirit so far off

From myself--me--that I should bring thee proof

In words, of love hid in me out of reach.

Nay, let the silence of my womanhood

Commend my woman-love to thy belief,--

Seeing that I stand unwon, however wooed,

And rend the garment of my life, in brief,

By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude,

Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief.


End file.
